The 2013 edition of the annual Edelman Trust Barometer found "a very significant crisis of leadership, " said Richard Edelman, president and CEO of Chicago-based public relations firm Edelman.

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More than four in five of the general public would expect a business leader to lie when confronted with a difficult issue, according to the PR firm's trust barometer.

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However, according to the Edelman Trust Barometer, trust in business is still tenuous, with nearly 70% of respondents saying that business and financial companies will revert to old habits when the financial crisis is over.

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Several years back, PR Guru Richard Edelman started an annual survey called the Trust Barometer and he discovered that in most years, most people are mostly influenced by people like themselves, rather than advertising or point of purchase displays.

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Unfortunately, Madoff has become the barometer of trust, where skepticism rather than hope is the baseline.

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